In December of 1993 my mom was diagnosed with vocal cord cancer. This news hit the family pretty hard.
I had prayed night after night for a whole week asking God to let the test results come back saying mom didn't have cancer. I just couldn't understand. Was there something I was doing wrong for the reason my prayer didn't get answered? Oh, but my prayer did get answered. In a way I would have never imagined.

After a couple of days when all of this had time to sink in, I remember standing at the kitchen sink washing dishes and thinking of mom having to endure radiation treatments every day for six weeks. She was going to get really sick and lose her hair. This was going to be a long and hard journey for us all, but mostly for my mom.

I closed my eyes and began to pray asking God to be with my mom through this hard journey and help our family to get through this. After praying I began to feel somewhat better knowing God would be with us. And I kept telling myself that God will not put anymore on us than we can handle. So if God was putting this obsticle in our life then we can handle it. As I returned my concentration on finishing the dishes I heard God whisper to me, "Susan, Remember the prayer?" I lifted my head and stared out the window trying to figure out what this meant. I was trying to think which prayer He meant because I had prayed so many. Then He whispered to me again, "Dad and drinking." I began to feel chills run over my whole body. Now I was beginning to understand. God was letting me know that He was answering my prayer.

A few months back I had asked God to help my dad quit drinking. I told God that if it meant using me to make him quit I was okay with that. I was willing to accept whatever it took to make my dad quit.
If it meant me getting sick or giving my life I would. And I ended that pray with "Thy will be done." And it wasn't until that day standing in front of the kitchen sink that everything began to make sense.

I had asked God to use me to make my dad quit drinking, but God knew that wouldn't work. I was not my dad's weakness. My mom was. All I could do now was pray for my mom to get better and I did just that, day and night. With God's help we would get through this. My mom went through radiation treatment everyday for six weeks and it was really hard on her and the rest of the family. Luckily it was caught in the earliest stage and that gave us hope.

God healed my mom and she is cancer free and my dad quit drinking.
God does answer prayers, in the way He choses. When God answered my prayer He taught me we do not always get our prayers answered the way we want them to be answered but they do get answered. And He whispered to me, "I told you I would never forsake you."